


Illness, Work and Pear Cider

by samcat



Series: Q's Vacation [3]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Established Relationship, Fluff, Kissing, Lots of kissing, M/M, Work, nude photography
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-07-22 04:21:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7419574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samcat/pseuds/samcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The vacation is cut short when M calls our couple back to London as two other agents go missing. Q catches a cold on his way back home, but soon manages to recover both his health and the missing agents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Back To London

The rain was pouring down, their luck with good weather clearly having worn off. Not that it mattered - M had called them back to London and they were currently heading towards the airport. It was early morning and nobody else seemed to be outside - the combination of horrible weather and ungodly early hours gave them the street all to themselves.

The water splashed from puddles around their feet as they walked huddled together under a single umbrella. Q was still carrying his large camping backpack on his back, not having had time to go shopping for a new suitcase that would be more suitable for air travels. It would be way too big to carry as hand luggage, so he had taken out as much stuff he could carry without it and put it in his pockets. The camera was back around his neck, getting worryingly wetter by the second. He hadn’t had a chance to make a backup of the pictures he had taken yet and he worried he might lost them. Not that it was something that should matter too much to him, he told himself. But he would like to have something to remember this vacation by.

Q took his eyes away from the ground for a second - instantly punished by stepping into a deep puddle and getting soaking wet up to his ankles - to look at James’ face. He looked stern, worried even, and Q didn’t like it. James was the one who had gotten the call that summoned them back to London and hadn’t told Q the details of it, other than that two other agents had gone missing and that they both needed to return at once to help locate and, if possible, retrieve them. Clenching his jaw, he turned his attention back to his feet to avoid as many other small lakes of rainwater as he could.

When they reached the airport he left the checking-in to James while he hurried away to one of the bathrooms to change. He knew he wouldn’t be of much use to MI6 if he was knocked out in bed with a cold, so he intended to do what he could to prevent that from happening.

Q locked himself into a stall and kicked off his shoes and socks first, both of them wet enough for water to literally pour from them. He took off his jacket too, hanging it over the door handle and letting a water drip from it and form a small puddle on the floor.

Wiggling his toes a bit to get some feeling back into them, he opened his bag and sighed when he realised the only other pair of shoes he had with him were a pair of thin trainers. He put on a double pair of socks before pulling them on, hoping he would be able to keep himself dry for long enough to get onto the plane. The lower parts of his trousers were soaked as well, but a small bathroom stall was not the ideal place to get out of a pair of wet skinny jeans. He dug out a hoodie from the bag before closing it, deciding he might as well leave his wet footwear and jacket here. He felt no attachment to them and saw no reason to sacrifice the dryness of the inside of his bag by putting them in there.

Before pulling on the hoodie he grabbed some paper towels to wipe off his camera. He bit his lower lip as he tried to turn it on and exhaled in relief when it worked just fine. Turning it off again, he made a mental note to make all of his tech fully waterproof from now on.

There was a knock on the door. “Are you done soon, darling?”  
Biting back a snarky response and instead unlocking the door and walking out, Q stepped straight into James’ chest. Both of them wobbled slightly at the impact.  
“Oof,” Q took half a step back into the stall. “You’re in the way.”  
“Obviously,” James gave him a smile that looked forced. “My apologies. But we need to hurry, our plane is leaving now.”  
“Now?”  
“Technically it was supposed to leave a few minutes ago. But they’re waiting for us,” James turned around and started walking away before Q could reply, expecting him to follow him without any more questions. Which is exactly what Q did.

-

When they sat down in their seats - Q by the window, with James next to him - Q’s phone buzzed. An update from the cat-sitter that included a picture of both his cats sleeping on a windowsill.  


He felt James lean on his shoulder as he checked the text. James made a mocking ‘aww’ that Q decided to ignore. Instead he wiggled his shoulder to tell James to stop looking at his phone. Q was sure he’d understood the hint, but he still didn’t turn away.  
“Which one’s Foss?”  
Q sighed and turned the screen of his phone towards James to give him a better view.  
“The calico is Foss,” he pointed at the screen. “And the fluffy black one is Tesla,” he gave a skittish smile and felt guilty for feeling happy to be going back home to his cats. Of course he would have loved to stay on this - apparently - romantic vacation for longer, but as that wasn’t happening he might as well allow himself to feel happy to be going home.  
James hummed and leaned back away from Q, allowing him to type out a reply to the cat-sitter in private. He told them that their services would soon no longer be needed, as he was coming back to resume care of the cats himself.  


“So it’s Tesla that hates me then,” James said as he fastened his seatbelt.  
“You can’t blame him for scratching you,” Q replied. “You kept teasing him when he clearly wasn’t interested in playing with you.”  
“How should I have known he wasn’t interested,” James said. “What kind of cat doesn’t like to play cat-and-mouse?”  
“The kind that doesn’t enjoy being the mouse.”  
James laughed at that, causing Q to smile.  
“I’ll buy you a book about cats’ body-language once we get back home,” Q said as he fumbled to get his belt on as well.

-

Less than an hour after take-off, Q’s phone ran out of battery. He frowned at the black screen in his hand before he put it back into his pocket.

He closed his eyes and leaned back against the seat, feeling annoyed over his still damp clothes. He started to suspect a cold would be inevitable after all.

After pushing the button to get a stewardess to bring him some tea, he looked over at James. The other man’s craggy profile was always a nice distraction. If the stewardess hadn’t showed up and broken the spell, he might had spent the rest of the flight simply looking at the other man’s face.

Clearing his throat, he requested a cup of tea. James turned to her with a smile to ask for a drink for himself as well. Q once again resisted the urge to make a snarky comment, this time about his drinking habits. Instead he turned away his focus from James and took the lens cap off his camera, taking a few shots out of the window. The weather was considerably better now that they were above the clouds.

The stewardess returned with their drinks and Q gratefully took the cup of hot tea from her. His throat was already starting to ache - and as much as he told himself it was just a placebo and not an actual cold yet, he felt much more comfortable now that he had a hot beverage to soothe it.

He drank his tea in silence while James chatted with the stewardess, eventually getting her to bring him one more drink, then another. He considered continuing to ignore this, but coming home to London with a drunk 007 to look after was not a thought that he found appealing.

He was getting ready to tell him off after the fourth glass, but as if James could read his mind, he didn’t call back the stewardess after that. Q finished the last of his tea at the same time as James finished his last drink. He watched his face closely, but saw nothing different. Relaxing back into his seat again, he reminded himself that James knew how to handle his alcohol. Most of the time.

“Seems like a nice girl,” James said about the stewardess.  
Q snorted. “Are you going to snog her in the bathroom before we land?”  
James raised his eyebrows at him. “Do I detect jealousy in your voice?”  
Q replied only with a laugh that was barely more than a short exhale.  
“If you want me to snog you in the bathroom, just ask,” James said. “In fact, it’s about time I renewed my membership of the mile high club.”  
“I can manage just fine without that, thank you,” Q said as he reclined his seat back and stared out of the window.

Had he not had an upcoming cold that already made him feel exhausted, had the plane not been full of other passengers, had he not had two missing agents to worry about… he might have considered James’ offer more seriously. But as things were now, he put the thought of the two of them squeezed into a small, locked space several thousands of feet into the air way back in the archives of his brain. Maybe to bring it back out some other day. James didn’t push it any further and Q enjoyed the silence that fell between them.

He fiddled with his phone in his pocked, stroking a finger over its buttons. He wished he had remembered to charge it the night before and lectured himself for forgetting it, forgetting that he was supposed to be prepared to get shipped back to London at any time. He’d gotten too comfortable with himself.

He sighed and let go of his phone, instead pulling out a miniature rubik’s cube he had brought with him as a way to entertain himself just in case something were to happen to his phone. _Being prepared for one thing is better than being prepared for none_ , he told himself.

It wasn’t much larger than a keychain charm, which was handy when it came to traveling light. Slowly twisting the sides of it without really paying attention to the colors, he let himself get lost in the rhythmic clicking sound it made.

Continuing to twist the cube with one hand, he started to drift off to sleep as he tried his best to ignore the sound of James now outright flirting with the stewardesses.

-

He woke up again as they landed. James was still sitting where he had been when he fell asleep - and his clothes looked no more wrinkled than before, meaning that the flirting with the stewardess had lead to nowhere.

They deplaned and hurried into the cab that was waiting for them. The weather here was thankfully, and surprisingly, better than it had been in Vermont. Q sent out a grateful thought to London’s clouds for not raining for once and allowing him to keep his trainers dry.

Q rubbed the sleep from his eyes and shook his head to wake himself up. His throat felt worse than it had before and all attempts James made to start a conversation with him went unanswered. He felt the need to save what little was left his voice for work.

When they arrived, they barely had time to set a foot outside the car before Q was surrounded by a crowd of stressed and worried members of the Q-branch who quickly herded him towards his work station. James wasn’t treated much differently, getting dragged away in the opposite direction by three other agents. Q hadn’t expected anything else than to work separately from James once they got back - that is how it always was - but he felt a tinge of regret for not having taken the opportunity to fully enjoy James’ company in the cab, as they probably wouldn’t have another chance to be together in private like that again until they had got the missing agents back. Q knew it was optimistic to think ‘when’ in a scenario like this, but he didn’t want to entertain the thought of somebody dying under his watch - or even worse, someone already having died because he was away on a vacation.

The people who had come to meet him by the car and drag him with them back to his work space disappeared quickly back to their stations once they entered their part of the building, leaving him to get himself settled back in on his own. This was not out of the usual, but at a time like this he would have appreciated to have at least one of his coworkers by his side as he went through the information about what had happened.

He put his camera down on his desk and emptied out his overfull pockets next to it. Waving over one of his coworkers, he got them to lend him their phone charger. Once he had plugged his phone in and felt it buzz reassuringly in his hand, he sat down by how computer and got to work.

The next couple of hours was spent going through what the agents mission had been and what they knew had happened to them, as well as what they speculated had happened to them after they lost contact with them.

The night was a long and stressful one, but once the sun rose Q had managed to locate one of the missing agents. While their standard radio transmitters had been anything but useful, Q had been relieved to find out that they had been equipped with a few of his new prototypes - some of which contained hidden new experimental tracking and communication devices that he had neglected to tell the rest of Q-branch about.

It had been a bit embarrassing explaining this to M. Having to admit that he had snuck experimental equipment into the field without his knowledge or approval was far from a fun experience. But thanks to the fact that this had apparently saved the agent’s life, and might end up saving the other one as well if luck would have it, he got off without much repercussion. M seemed too relieved to get his agent back to worry about punishing his quartermaster, though Q feared this might get brought back up at some point in the future. He’d have to be more careful about how he handled and stored his prototypes from now on.

A team, a team that included James, had moved in to get the agent in question. When they got the news later that day that they had got him on a plane heading back home, safe and sound, a cheer swept through the tired Q-branch. A few people went home after that, feeling too tired to be able to do anything useful. But most stayed, Q included. He felt exhausted. Jetlagged, sick and already overworked. But he intended to continue working until he had gotten the other agent back as well, or until he passed out. Whichever came first.

-

The rest of Q-branch almost jumped out of their skin at the sound of Q’s first sneeze. Disgusted with himself, he wiped off his computer screen with the sleeve of his shirt and waved his other hand at his coworkers, wordlessly telling them to go back to what they were doing instead of staring at him.

It was late night now again and they had made no progress with the attempts to locate the other missing agent. They still hadn’t managed to find a way to reestablish contact with them, let alone locate them.

His body felt heavy, his fingers no longer flying over his keyboard - a more apt description would be that they sluggishly dragged themselves over it. He stopped what he was doing and brought up his hands to rub his face. He knew he needed to rest, but he felt undeserving of it.

He flinched and looked up at James over his glasses when the agent set down a tupperware container on his keyboard.  
“Chicken soup,” James said as he sat down in a chair next to him, opening up an identical container and starting to eat from it.  
“Since when do you ever bring me food,” Q’s voice was only a whisper, barely audible. The cold was no longer imaginary. He picked the container up with suspicion and started to eat. “In fact, since when do you cook?”  
“A ‘welcome back’ would have been appreciated,” James replied. “I hope you don’t mind that I made a mess of your kitchen while making this.”  
Q huffed as a reply and took a bite. “Wait,” he swallowed. “You were in my flat?”  
“You gave me a key.”  
“I didn’t expect you to use it.”  
“Well, I did. And I fed your cats,” James smiled at him. “I still don’t like the way Tesla looks at me.”  
Q laughed at that, but quickly regretted it as it turned into a coughing fit. When he recovered he saw James looking at him worriedly. Q waved a hand at him dismissively and continued eating.  
“You sound terrible,” James said.  
Q just waved at him again, no longer sure if he would have enough of his voice left to even whisper. He put down the now half-empty tupperware container and went back to typing away at his keyboard, ignoring James until he sighed and left Q to work alone.

The rest of the night and morning passed by slowly. Sneezing and coughing, his voice only surviving thanks to one of the newer members of Q-branch continuously bringing him cups of tea and cough drops. Q knew it was just an attempt to suck up to him, but he appreciated it nonetheless

When noon came, they still hadn’t managed to get any closer to getting the other agent home. Or even finding a way to confirm - or deny - that they were even still alive. All they had managed to do was to create a discouragingly long list of things that didn’t work.

Q rubbed his temples and spun around on his chair to face away from his computer screens. His head was aching. He needed to sleep, he knew that, but he didn’t know if he’d be able to fall asleep even if he tried. His mind was still working on its highest setting, though it hadn’t had a thought that made any sense in the last couple of hours.

He sighed and stood up, wobbled on the spot for a couple seconds and then sat back down. Blinking a few times, he accepted the fact that he was more exhausted than he had first thought. He collected the things he had scattered around his desk when he arrived, using that time to steel himself for the next attempt at standing. When he stood up again, he kept one hand firmly against the wall for support as he walked out of his office.

Nobody stopped him from leaving. However, he stopped himself a few times to whisper out instructions for what he wanted the other members of Q-branch to try while he was gone. He wasn’t going to be gone for long, he told them. He assured them he was just going home to recharge for a couple of hours and that he’d be back again in the evening - and that if they hadn’t managed to reach the missing agent by themselves while he was gone, his rested brain would come up with a solution in no time.

Even when he was as miserable as he was, he still felt the need to at least pretend to be optimistic. But it was hard. If he were to be honest with himself, he’d admit that this was more likely to turn into a body-retrieval mission.

-

When he arrived at his flat he almost forgot to pay the cab driver who had driven him there. Mumbling an apology to the man who had run after him when he had simply got out of the cab and started to walk away, he gave him the tip of his lifetime. One definite perk of being the quartermaster, he thought, is the pay. Q felt indifferent to parting with the money - though at this point he was so tired he thought he would be feeling indifferent to just about anything.

He was a bit upset with himself for having forgotten that he’d needed to pay the man. Perhaps he was too used to being driven around by coworkers, or perhaps his mind was too tired to remember basic things like paying for services. The second option scared him a little. He was not unaccustomed to pulling all-nighters, so the fact that his memory was already deteriorating like this was alarming. He decided to blame it on his illness.  
“Bloody cold,“ he whispered to himself as he fumbled to get the key into the lock, only to then clench his jaw and lecture himself for having forgotten how much his throat hurt when he spoke. He really needed sleep. His memory was getting worse by the second.

Locking the door behind him and kicking off his shoes, he didn’t bother to undress any further before he walked over to his bed and curled up into a ball under the covers. He was vaguely aware of his cats jumping up in bed next to him before he fell asleep.

He woke up a few hours later from a coughing fit. Panicking at the pain and the feeling that he was going to eject his lungs from his body, he rolled out of the bed and fell down to the floor - causing both cats to jump off the bed and run out of the room, seemingly panicking just as much as he did.

He stayed on the floor, not as much by choices as by necessity, until he had regained some control of his breathing and the pain had started to fade away. When he had taken a few deep breathes, he carefully stood up and leaned against the bed for a few seconds, not quite trusting himself not to fall over if he stood without something to support himself on.

Grabbing his glasses from the bedside table, he put them on and made his way out to the kitchen to drink a few glasses of water. Once his throat felt less like sandpaper, he took a painkiller and sat down on one of the kitchen chairs to gather up the strength needed to make his way back to the bed.

But before he got a chance to do that, his phone started ringing. He looking around his flat in confusion for a few moments, unable to see where his phone was, before he realised it was still in his pocket.

When he picked it up he wasn’t able to reply with much more than a croak, but the person on the other end - someone from Q-branch, whose voice he eventually recognised as belonging to the newcomer who had previously appointed himself Q’s personal tea-bringer - informed him that they had made progress.

They had located the missing agent. Or at least one of the devices that they had been equipped with. Weather they would only recover the device or if it was still attached to a person - or a body - was yet to be discovered.

Q managed to get out enough words to request them to send a cab to drive him back there, which they eagerly agreed to do.  
“You sure you’re well enough to come here?” the voice asked. It wasn’t a genuine question - they wanted him back there, sick or not.  
“Of course,” Q told them and hung up.

He put the phone down on the table in front of him and stared at nothing for a few seconds while he digesting the news. Maybe it wouldn’t turn into a body retrieval mission after all. Maybe he’d keep his ‘no agents have died under my watch yet’-record.

He decided the wrinkly clothes he was wearing would do, as he saw no reason to waste what little energy he had on changing into something else. He pocketed his phone and walked out of his flat. Once outside, he leaned his back against the house wall in order to keep himself upright while he waited for the cab to arrive.

-

Even though the drive back to MI6 was a short one, he fell asleep in the cab and was awoken by the driver telling him to wake up and get out. His trip had already been payed for this time, as evident by that they drove away as soon as he closed the car door behind him.

When he walked into the building and towards Q-branch he still felt fatigued, but he was starting to get a bit steadier on his feet now. As he was swiftly surrounded by other people, he listened to them explain what had been going on during the short amount of time he had been gone.

They had followed the instructions he had given them before he left - instructions that he hadn’t actually believed would lead to anything. But it had worked. They had managed to re-activate a GPS locator in one of the devices that the agent had with them. They were far from where they were supposed to be, out somewhere in the middle of nowhere. The current theory that the people of Q-branch seemed to have agreed upon was that they had been captured and then dropped off - or was still being kept - where they now were.

Q still felt somewhat doubtful that the agent would be alive once the team they had sent out reached them, but he made himself smile encouraging and praised them for the work they had done in his absence. He was proud of them. He always was. As much as he sometimes liked to complain about the incompetence of the people around him, he often found himself more than satisfied with his staff and coworkers.

To his surprise, Q found James standing by his desk when he walked into his office.  
Q eyed him as he walked past him to sit down on his chair. “I thought you’d be on the rescue team.”  
“I managed to avoid that this time,” James smiled. “You still sound terrible.”  
Q cleared his throat and coughed. Before he had a chance to reply, James spoke again.  
“I came over here to congratulate you on getting the missing agents back.”  
“I’d rather wait with the celebrations until we know for certain that they are alive,” Q’s throat protested against being made to speak, but he was able to force out something that was more than a whisper now. Though it still hurt to speak and his voice still sounded nothing like it normally did, he had regained some volume to it.  
“I’ll hang around until we get the good news, then.”  
Q knew he probably wasn’t allowed to be annoyed by James’ positivity since he himself had said many similar things to his coworkers in the past 24 hours, but he couldn’t stop himself from frowning.  
“Very well,” Q said. “But try not to get in the way. We still have work to do here.”

James hung around Q’s office for most of the rest of the day, only occasionally leaving when he was summoned by some higher-up and once when he left to get them food. It was once again served in tupperware containers, though this time they contained some sort of pasta dish rather than chicken soup.

It tasted about as messy as it looked. That is to say: very. Q ate it slowly while he worked, trying to turn his focus away from the taste. James was eating next to him, not bothered in the slightest by the way his food tasted as far as Q could tell.

Q figured he might have desensitized himself to his own cooking. Or maybe his own tastebuds were knocked silly by his cold. Still, he appreciated the fact that James seemed to have taken it upon himself to provide him with food. It was a sign of affection he had not expected to see from him.

He finished the code he was working on at the same time he took the last bite of pasta. Putting his fork down into the container, he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He heard James walk towards him and smiled when he felt him put his hands on his shoulders.  
“You’re tense,” James said as he massaged the quartermaster’s shoulders.  
“I always am when I work,” Q said and reluctantly opened his eyes. “Have we got any news from the rescue team yet?”  
“Afraid not,” James said. “But they should have reached the site now. So if all goes well we should hear back from them soon.”  
Q hummed in reply and closed his eyes again as he began relaxing. He knew he’d tense up again as soon as he went back to work, but he decided to allow himself to enjoy the moment.

-

The next midnight arrived, as did the message that the team had recovered the missing agent - alive, but only barely - and that they were going to get back to London in a few days. Another cheer ran through the whole of Q-branch at the news as they patted each other on the backs, all of them jubilant that they had managed to somehow get both agents back without needing to stick them in body bags.

James, who was still lounging around in Q’s office, turned to Q and smiled. “Congratulations.”  
Q laughed. He felt too tired to join in with the celebration that broke out among his coworkers, but he cherished the feeling of joy and relief that washed over him.

No deaths. None, not under his watch.

“Ready to celebrate a work well done now then?” James grinned at him.  
“I reckon I’m going to celebrate by going home and getting a good night’s sleep,” Q said as he held back a yawn. He knew he needed to let his body rest properly in order to get rid of the cold, and that was what he intended to do before anything else now that he knew the missing agents were both safe.  
“I’ll drive you.”  
Q didn’t object.

He didn’t object when James followed him into his flat either, nor when he undressed and laid down next to him in bed.

Resting his head against James’ chest, he closed his eyes and listened to the sound of his breathing and his heart beating. In every previous relationship he had had, he had always found the sound of the other person’s heartbeat to be uncomfortable. It was always too loud, too annoying.

But with James it was different. With him, the sound was an assurance that he was still alive. An assurance of something that he had always taken for granted with his other partners - that they would stay alive, that he wouldn’t suddenly get a message that they had passed away while he had been too busy to keep an eye on them. With James, he had to worry. But the sound of his breath and his heartbeat helped him to let go of that worry. And it was with those sounds in his ears that he drifted off to sleep.


	2. A Day Off

Q woke up the next morning to the sound of James turning on the shower. Having the bathroom right next to the bedroom was something he had considered a purely positive thing while he lived alone, but since James had started to more and more frequently spend the nights at his place he had realised the downsides. He had been awoken to the sound of the shower so many times now that he had started to hate that sound.

His body screamed at him to go back to sleep. His plan to sleep the cold away had evidently not yet succeeded. He moaned and rolled over onto his side, not bothering to open his eyes, and tried to will himself back out of consciousness.

“Not hungry?” James said as he sat down on the bed next to Q a few minutes later.  
Confused, Q finally opened his eyes and saw a tray on the bedside table in front of him. On it was a cup of tea and a plate with a few slices of toast. Both of which had gone cold by now.  
“I knew I’d wake you up,” James said while he pulled on his socks and turned his head to look at Q. “So I thought you’d enjoy some breakfast in bed.”  
“I would have if I’d known it was there,” Q sat up and leaned against the headboard. “Why couldn’t you just have told me?”  
“I thought you’d open your eyes when you woke up.”  
“You need to stop making assumptions about me,” Q sighed and closed his eyes again.  
James laughed and leaned over to give Q a quick kiss on the cheek.  
“Would you like me to make another attempt at bringing you breakfast?”  
Q hummed approvingly.  
“Very well,” James cupped Q’s face in his hand and gave him another kiss, this time on the lips, before standing up. “I’ll be right back.”  
Chuckling, Q opened his eyes just in time to see James, clad in only his underwear, disappear around the corner.

Q cleared his throat and stretched his arms up over his head. When he lowered them again, he let his fingers run through his hair on the way down in an attempt to tame the ridiculous bed head he knew he had.

He reached over to the bedside table and grabbed his glasses that were lying next to the tray of cold tea and toast. Putting them on, he started to feel a bit more awake as the world around him became less blurry. He yawned and leaned back against the headboard again. He couldn’t remember the last time he had breakfast in bed and he felt childishly excited about it.

The soft sound of paws walking across the floor was soon followed by both of his cats jumping up into bed.  
“Where have you two been all night?” Q said, immediately regretting the squeaky voice he’d made. His throat might be able to handle normal speech well enough again, but going high-pitched was clearly not a good idea.  
Foss was standing with his front paws on his chest, purring, while Tesla had curled up into a ball by his feet and looking to already be half asleep.  
“Avoiding me, I bet,” James said as he returned with another tray in his hands - a larger one this time. On it were two cups, a pot of tea, a plate with fresh toast and a small jar of marmalade.  
“You might as well bring the whole kitchen with you next time,” Q said as James sat down on the bed next to him, he too leaning back against the headboard.  
Gently pushing an offended Foss out of the way, James placed the tray on top of their legs and pecked another kiss at Q’s lips.  
“And you really need to stop kissing me,” Q said as he took a piece of toast and spread some marmalade on it.  
“And why is that?” James asked.  
“England might fall if we’re both sick at the same time,”  
Laughing, James defyingly kissed him again. “It’s a risk I’m willing to take.”

They enjoyed a mostly quiet breakfast together, occasionally needing to push Foss away from the tray, until James’ phone rang.  
Swallowing a last bite of toast, he wiped the crumbs off his hands - and onto the bed, to Q’s displeasure - and got up to answer it.  
“It’s work,” he said to Q before he answered the call. “Yes?”  
Q nodded at him and put the tray on the side of the bed where James had been a few seconds ago, not bothering to stop Foss from getting to it anymore. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and stood up as James walked out of the room, listening attentively to what the person on the phone was saying to him.

He had pulled on a shirt and a pair of trousers when James came back into the bedroom.  
“What’s the mission this time?” Q asked as James walked over to him.  
“Only a small London-based one, so I should be back again before the day is over,” James said with a confident smile. “And I told them that you were taking a sick day today.”  
“What? Why?” Q straightened his back and frowned at him. “I’m quite capable of working.”  
“You’re ill.”  
“Not that ill.”  
“I’m sure they will manage one day without you.”  
“I doubt it. I’ll come back and they’ll have blown up the whole building, if not the whole country.”  
“Q, take a day off,” James leaned in and kissed him. “You deserve it.”  
Unable to think of a reply in time before James had walked out the door, Q stood still until he heard Foss knock over one of the cups on the tray. He shook his head and shooed both of the cats off the bed. While he didn’t appreciate what would probably be a permanent tea stain on his covers, he was almost happy to have a reason to change the bedding - that way he would at least not have to spend the next night sleeping in toast crumbs.

-

Q ended up deciding not to use his day off for resting. He had tried to go back to sleep after he changed the sheets on the bed, but had failed to do so. Even though his body was still tired, his brain had ridden itself of the illness induced fog and it was buzzing with too many thoughts and ideas for him to be able to relax.

Instead he got his camera out and started fiddling with it. He had thought of a few upgrades he wanted to give it - the waterproofing would have to wait until he got back to his work station at Q-branch, but there were a few things that he could do from home. The first thing he did was to make sure that any pictures taken with it would be instantly backed up and uploaded to his storage. Once he had tested this new feature out by following and photographing two more and more annoyed cats around the flat for a few minutes, he was satisfied and placed the camera on James’ bedside table, intending to move it later.

After that he spent a significant part of the day cleaning up the kitchen - how James had managed to create such a disaster site just by making tea and toast was beyond him - and grocery shopping. Normally he would have hated the mundanity of it all, but having simple tasks to carry out allowed him to work through some of the thoughts that were still flying around in chaos inside his head. He’d even taken the time to stop by some other shops on his way home, just to give himself more time to go through his thoughts and decide which ideas to continue working on.

-

When night fell and James returned, Q stood in the kitchen cooking a late dinner.  
“Feeling better?” James said as he shrugged off his coat.  
“Much better,” Q’s voice was still slightly raspy. “Not that it was bad enough to warrant a day off work to begin with.”  
“I still think a sick day was appropriate,” James looked past him to see what he was cooking. ”Half of Q-branch is knocked out by that monster cold you spread all over the place.”  
Q sighed. “If they’re understaffed then there’s even more reason for why I should have been there today.”  
“They were fine,” James leaned in and gave him a kiss. “Don’t worry about it.”  
Q sighed again, but smiled at James. “Fine,” he gestured towards the cupboard. “If you’ll set the table, I’ll finish dinner.”  
“Of course,” he moved past Q to take two plates out of the cupboard. Balancing the plates on one hand, he walked back towards the table and tapped Q’s ass on the way past.  
Q rolled his eyes, but decided not to comment on it.

During dinner James told him about the day’s mission. He didn’t ever pause long enough for Q to be able to say anything of importance, so he figured he just needed to vent. When he realised that, he had lost some interests in listening and had allowed his mind to drift away to different places. But from what he gathered, it had been a very boring mission. Though any mission where he wasn’t risking his life seemed to count as ‘boring’ in James’ book.  
The next time James made a small pause, Q took the chance to tease him.  
“Upset that they sent the great 007 on a mission that the world’s fate didn’t rely on?”  
James face softened as he ate the last bite of food and put his fork down on his now empty plate. “MI6 would hardly be able to save the world without you,” he smiled. “So I suppose it’s just as well that we didn’t need to do that today.”  
Q shook his head and smiled. “I’ll be sure to be back at work tomorrow then, in case the world needs me.”  
He stood up. “Finished?”, he asked as he gestured towards James’ plate. James nodded and handed it to him.

James looked back up when Q returned from the kitchen, having placed their plates, glasses and cutlery in the dishwasher. “Dessert?” he asks.  
“Better,” Q placed a couple of bottles on the table in front of him.  
“Cider? Seriously?”  
“We can’t always be drinking whiskey,” Q said as he sat back down.  
“You have a child’s taste in alcohol, Q.”  
“I wasn’t aware that children were allowed to drink cider these days.”  
“Then you need to start paying more attention,” James laughed and opened one of the bottles.

They continued to crack light-hearted jokes as they drank the cider, both the day’s mission and Q’s illness completely forgotten. Once the cider bottles were empty, James got up and brought them two glasses and a bottle of whiskey.  
“Are you seriously unable to _not_ drink whiskey for one night?” Q asked.  
“Yes,” James poured them both a drink.  
Q rolled his eyes and took his glass. He was already feeling tipsy, but he figured tonight was as good of a night to get drunk as any other.  
Still standing, James emptied his glass in one sweep and gestured towards the bedroom. “It’s late. What do you say we go to bed?”  
“While drinking?” Q made a face.  
“Why not?”  
“I have already changed the sheets today,” Q said as he stood up.  
“Really? What were you up to while I was gone?”  
Q laughed. “Foss spilled tea on them.”  
“Since when does the cats drink tea?”  
“Stop,” Q laughed again. “You know that’s not what happened.”  
James picked the whiskey bottle up again in his free hand and winked at Q as he started walking towards the bed. Q sighed and followed him, glass in hand. He knew he wouldn’t be able to change James’ mind - and he figured that if he was going to get drunk, he might as well get drunk horizontally. That way he wouldn’t have to worry about falling over.

Soon both of them were back to where they had started the day, leaning their backs against the headboard. Q stifled a yawn and held his glass towards James, beckoning him to pour him some more whiskey. James grinned at him and obliged. When he put the bottle back down on the bedside table beside him, he knocked Q’s camera onto the floor.  
“Whoops,” he said. Downing what was left in his glass, he put it too down on the bedside table before he reached down for the camera.  
“Please be careful with that,” Q sat up straighter and looked worriedly at his camera when James picked it up. “That camera is very dear to me.”  
“I’ve noticed,” James took off the lens cap and stroked his fingers over the buttons. “You were playing cameraman all the time in Vermont.”  
Q laughed unconvincingly and reached for the camera, but James shifted out of the way of his grasp.  
“Hand it over.”  
“Hang on,” James said as he powered on the camera and started pressing buttons. “I have an idea.”  
“Careful-”  
The flash went off and momentarily blinded Q. Blinking furiously to get rid of the lights that danced in front of his eyes, he reached for the camera again. But just like the first time, James moved just far enough out of the way to keep out of reach.  
“Come on,” James said as Q’s vision started to return, just in time to see the other man wink at him. “Why not let me take a few provocative shots?”  
“I can think of a million reasons,” Q snapped. “Should I recite them to you in alphabetical order?”  
James laughed, but gave in and handed the camera back to its rightful owner. “Fine. You can continue being the cameraman, then.”  
Gaping, Q watched as James pushed him out of the way, undressed in just a few flowing motions and and splayed himself out on the bed. Q let himself be pushed away, sitting up on his knees at the foot of the bed. He continued to watch and James adjusted his position, making himself look like something out of a nude magazine of questionable quality.  
“You’re joking,” Q said when he remembered how to speak.  
“Not at all,” James winked at him. “I know you were taking pictures of me back in Vermont.”  
“Yes, but you were-”  
“Wearing clothes then?”  
Q laughed. “Yes.”  
“So you prefer me when I’m clothed?”  
“Well, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that.”  
“Then what’s the problem?”  
Q chewed on his bottom lip as he thought about it. What was he objecting to? He supposed he worried about other people finding the pictures of James - though, thinking about it, he was sure there were already far more compromising pictures of him floating around somewhere. Perhaps he was worried that someone would find out that _he_ had taken the pictures. But he could always make sure to encrypt the files to make them untraceable...  
He shook his head. “It doesn’t exactly look artistic.”  
“We’re not going for artistic,” James chuckled. “We’re going for authentic.”  
Laughing, Q shook his head again.  
“Come on.”  
There was a few seconds of silence, then Q leaned over the edge of the bed to put his glass down on the floor.  
“Fine,” he relented as he sat back up and put the camera to his eyes. “Move your right hand to your thigh.”  
James gave a sly smile and did as he was told.

-

When he walked into the kitchen the next morning, James saw Q sitting with his legs crossed on one of the chairs, laptop in his lap, a bottle of pear cider on the table.  
“Starting the day with a drink now, are you?”  
“I’m starting to pick up your bad habits,” Q replied without looking away from the screen. “I bought you a gift yesterday, by the way,” he said and nodded towards a small, gift-wrapped box that lay on the kitchen counter.  
James raised his eyebrows at Q before he walked over to it. “What’s the occasion?”  
“None.”  
“None?”  
“Am I not allowed to buy my lover gifts without there being an occasion?”  
Smiling at being called ‘lover’, James picked up the gift and put it under his arm. “I’m heading to MI6, M called earlier. They need you too there today. Do you need a ride?”  
“I am quite capable of traveling on my own, thank you.” Q still didn't look up from the screen.  
James shrugged and hung his coat over his arm on the way out. The weather is pleasantly warm this morning, as if it is reflecting his own good mood.

When he arrived to MI6 and parked his car, James decided it would be best to open the gift in private. Not that Q had ever bought him something improper before, but he figured it was best to be safe. Q had admitted to picking up on his bad habits, after all.

He unwrapped the gift half expecting to find a new gadget, half expecting to find a dildo. Or a combination of the two. So when it was neither, it took his brain a few seconds to process what was in his hands.

Rolling his eyes and sighing, he tossed the book over into the passenger seat and left the car. He had better things to do with his time than read bloody “Feline Behaviour 101”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. I am amazing at procrastinating.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for taking so long to post this part! I decided to split it up into two chapters so that you can get some of it now while I finish the ending. The next chapter will be full of fluff, I promise you that.


End file.
